This Fun Story About a 25-Year-Old Faking His Way Into High School Basketball Turns Out to Be Not Fun at All

If we know anything about the Year of Our Lord 2018, it's that even things that seem good—or that might have been good if they'd happened in another era—are bad. Take this story of a 25-year-old Texas man who posed as a 17-year-old in order to realize his dream of playing high school basketball again. In fact, I have written an eerily similar story for this very publication, but it was from early 2016 when we were young and starry-eyed and could countenance a headline like, "So It Turns Out This Guy Dominating His High School League Is 30 Years Old."

At first glance, this week's tale seems like the same kind of deal. The fabulously named Sidney Bouvier Gilstrap-Portley was dominating the competition on behalf of Hillcrest High in Dallas, Texas—except he was going by Rashun Richardson. He was offensive player of the year, winning the adoration of his teammates and fellow high-schoolers, until his web of deception fell apart. Another zany American tale.

Except Gilstrap-Portley went a bit farther than some of the others in the long line of high school posers, some of whom were highlighted by Deadspin. It turns out he was able to evade traditional background check procedures by claiming he was a refugee of Hurricane Harvey. Gilstrap-Portley learned the area's schools were accepting evacuees with minimal paperwork because of their circumstances. He also claimed, according to The Washington Post, to be homeless and have an absentee mother. None of that was true, and these seem like particularly grotesque lies to conjure up just so you can dunk on some 16-year-olds.

“For him to take advantage of the Harvey situation and then the homeless laws and get himself in front of our students," Dallas Independent School District Superintendent Michael Hinojosa said, "it is frustrating."

Gilstrap-Portley was found out in April, The Washington Post reported, after his former (real) high school coach recognized him while the 25-year-old was playing in a tournament.

“It’s unbelievable to me that he could get away with this."

But it gets worse. Apparently, Gilstrap-Portley was dating a 14-year-old girl at the school, whose mother told The Dallas Morning-News that the two did not have a sexual relationship but they did kiss. “I’m upset, frustrated, angry and sad at the same time,” the mother said. “If it’s happening at Hillcrest, then it could be happening somewhere else. People need to know. It could have gone differently if he had other intentions to hurt her or to traffic her." She added: “It’s unbelievable to me that he could get away with this...I don’t know what, how [the school] let this slip through the cracks.”

Just to pile a bit on top, the Post reports:

At Hillcrest basketball games, Gilstrap-Portley was occasionally seen cradling an infant girl in the company of a young woman, but they were assumed to be a sister and niece of his. It is now believed that she was his girlfriend and the mother of his child.

Another one of his former (real) high school coaches described Gilstrap-Portley as "a good kid."

"I never had any problems out of him," the coach told a local TV station. "That’s why I was shocked when I heard that all this came out, because that’s not the kid that I knew." He added Gilstrap Portley was "an average player" when he knew him—but not, apparently, when he was playing against kids as much as 10 years younger. Or telling everyone he was the victim of a horrific natural disaster, or homeless. Or dating a 14-year-old. Jesus.

Dallas police arrested Gilstrap Portley Friday on a felony charge of tampering with government records. That doesn't seem to encapsulate the full range of his activities.

Jack HolmesPolitics EditorJack Holmes is the Politics Editor at Esquire, where he writes daily and edits the Politics Blog with Charles P Pierce.

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